DISCLAIMER: A well-traveled (within city limits) Atlantan will note that some of these may seem off, that they should be larger or smaller than the space given. While maintaining as accurate a representation as possible, some square mileage stems from the location’s (usually a neighborhood) own claims, not professional measurements; and some buildings include only the ground floors’ occupied space as opposed to the entirety of the square footage within (warping some of the university areas, for one). So take this one with a grain of salt until I one day map these all out professionally myself, which will never happen, because that would take forever. But enjoy!
You’re gonna definitely wanna use zoom on this one, kids.
Just a quick exercise in data visualization in the vein of David McCandless, premier infographicist. This graphic is the first of what I hope to be many more that fulfill two goals: the inclusion of straightforward visualization of numerical data, as opposed to the usual facts & figures which have decorated this page so far: and the ability to generate simple but effective visuals that can be generated more quickly than and in between those same, more elaborate, graphics I’ve been doing. Instead of taking a month or more, for instance, I completed the research and design of this particular one in about 24 hours (not total; I literally had this idea yesterday). I will also probably continue to add new data to this one (for instance, oh, I didn’t put in any sports arenas or whatever [edit: now I have!]).
As to what you’re actually seeing, I’ve taken the acreage of several Atlanta landmarks, parks, and neighborhoods and condensed them into simple squares for easy comparison, with the colors indicating the various categories. I almost included Stone Mountain Park and Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, but they are HUGE. Stone Mountain, for instance, is about five times the size of this graph. The airport is, seriously, even bigger. It is a big airport.
TIME TO LEARN 